Sounds good. All right. Uh for today's agenda, we're going to talk about the project progress, what we have been up to since we last met last month, continuation on public outreach updates, sharing with
you the preliminary highendry network, and explain what is a high injury network, some counter measures, not specifically for the highendry network, but general counter measures that could be used along these corridors and just
in general. and we're going to talk about upcoming task and next steps. We'll love to have a member discussion and then just share when's our next vap meeting number three. I will share this to Bill.
>> All right. Thanks, Lisa. Um so just a quick update for everyone uh before we jump into the details. Uh since our last meeting, we have uh really been focused on analysis and developing what we refer
to as the high injury network or we'll say h so everyone knows the lingo. Uh we did hold a public information meeting. Um and we continue to use social media to get the word out. Uh solicit input.
Um we'll go through some of that. uh some of those results in a minute. Um obviously we still have our online input tool still active um and we're trying to push more and more people to to uh
utilize it. Um we're just about really ready to start identifying counter measures that will form really the safety action plan. uh we'll touch on that towards the end of the presentation just to sort of introduce some of the uh
thoughts um for that. And with that, I will turn it back to Lisa. >> Thank you. As Bill mentioned, we had our public meeting. We're just doing a sleuth of components that we have been up to regarding public outreach. We
mentioned this in the first meeting, but we want to just relay what we have been up to. uh for the public meeting. We also had Gardener Educational TV that actually videotaped and it's on their YouTube page as well and of course the project project website for the public
meeting leveraging the local newspaper, the gardener news. As Bill mentioned, we want to make sure that the public can see what's going on. So using social media such as the city's Facebook page, updating the project web page, which
includes like the public meeting materials, um the recordings, the VSAC meeting number one, the recording materials, meeting summary, as well as other materials. And then we're still leveraging that interactive comment
online tool, public coordinate. Definitely we want to make sure that like please share that out with folks because we want as many comments. We want to make sure that everybody is aware of this project. Um we we want to make sure that we're meeting where
people are at. So we will be attending the library's third annual community block party which is on June 24th and then also the 9th annual gardener food truck on 71. So, those are two upcoming
meetings or pop-up events where we're just going to see where people are at. We're going to ask them on their safety um their biggest safety concerns and then hopefully if they have time to provide us input on the public coordinate.
All right. So, for our public meeting, it was on April 29th on a Wednesday at the police department and it was great. We had approximately 10 attendees. We included representatives from Mass DOT. Colobby, thank you so much for
attending. He's here in this meeting as well. And then of course staff from the police department. For the public meeting, we had a a brief slide deck to introduce the project. We want to educate the public. What's the purpose of this project? And then we
also had a handful of engagement activities. For the engagement activities, we had two different boards because we need to remember that as part of the vision zero action plan is going to be a a set of
engineering like physical infrastructure but also those non-engineering ones. So we asked folks of hey what is needed regarding strategy policies and ideas? We got some really great input when we're talking about education
strategies. Some folks asked about a bicycle safety session, education of safe walking, especially at night time, making sure that people can see the person walking or just making sure that there are um
street lights ideally. Another one that they mentioned was education on how to cross the street. Ideally, no jaywalking. Some people mention regarding the city policies is just identifying appropriate
speed limits in some of the neighborhoods. So, just really understanding um speed limits and enforcement. And then there was a lot of um conversation with one particular person about methodology on parking on one side
of the street or um or on one side or no sides at all. Just like what's the methodology that the city actually does and making that more transparent to folks especially when when um doing the signage.
When we asked folks about what is their biggest safety concern, they talked about Route Two is not friendly for bicyclists, um, speeding along Pearl Street, especially at the schools nearby and along Chestnut Street.
Those were the public meeting recap. Again, we want to thank everybody that share the word, attended, and we're looking forward to our second one in the fall. I will hand this over to Liam.
>> Yep. Thanks, Lisa. So, using the public coordinate tool, we've received 120 comments uh over 120 comments so far. Um including online uses from the public through either the direct web page itself or through the project website
using the embedded map. um as well as during the public meeting and what we heard after the public meeting. We inputed some of the comments at the locations uh that were specified. Um and this kind of helped refine our high network to locations which we previously
didn't uh locate because of the crash data. But if it was such a big concern um through the public coordinate and through the public meetings um we included it in there as we'll talk about in a bit. Um just some of the locations that we received a lot of comments about
um West West Broadway at Tony Boulevard noting that it wasn't pedestrian friendly um lack of or inadequate pedestrian facilities um as it's a busy crossing and and pedestrians felt unsafe while walking through there. Uh we also
received a lot of comments regarding the intersection of West Street and Parker Street and Oak Street. um including that confusion of of yielding to the right of way um the queueing at Nickel Street and then often
driver behavior lack of yielding or or no yielding coming from Parker Street to the downtown area. Um and then we also looked at East Broadway at Union Street, South Main Street. um including some of the issues that was noted by the public included visibility
um with the existing parking there and it's tough to navigate for both uh pedestrians and vehicles. So, as previously mentioned, um throughout the the progress so far, we've begin to develop and and have developed a preliminary high injury
network, um which identifies top crash locations in terms of fatal and serious injury crashes. And this kind of serves as a as a sort of a basis for our plan develop in terms of development in terms of the counter measures um that we'll
eventually propose and we'll talk about how we developed it in the next slide. So we have a handful of factors that kind of went into picking the locations uh for the roadway segments as well as um individual intersections and overlapping intersections of those
chosen segments. Um so first of all we compiled all the crash data from the mass public crash data portal um reported between 2021 and 2025. Um and we took an overview of uh
identifying locations whether that be roadway segments or or intersections averaging over uh five reported crashes per year or 25 over the 5year period. um as well as um whether certain locations or not were experienced those those
fatal and serious injury crashes. Uh in addition, we looked at sort of any any areas or or any intersections where there were either a large cluster of pedestrian and bicycle crashes. Um and
then we also uh assign weights uh individually to the crashes based on their severity reported. Um, and we used that weighted score to develop density maps or or cluster maps um to sort of hone in on on
which intersections um popped up the most in terms of those dense areas um for those those high severity crashes uh as well as collisions with pedestrian and bicyclists. Um and in terms of looking
at the overall um city of Gardner, we reviewed uh where where certain locations um particularly the downtown area um or other areas where we would expect there to be a lot of pedestrian uh and bike bicyclist traffic um
creating a risk for some of those collisions with pedestrians uh and bicyclists as well. Um in addition, we also incorporated findings um and developments from the MRPC regional plan hydro network uh and sort of compared that with our crash data that we
developed um looking at the intersections uh and roadway segments that that they conducted or they concluded were in their high injury network. Uh in addition, we also looked at the mass dot high injury uh crash
locations. So, the vehicle crash locations in those clusters from 2019 to 2020 uh were located more on that Timnney Boulevard near near West Broadway and sort of up just south um of of the Rotary um underneath Route 2. And
then as well, we looked at the latest uh high injury location in terms of crash clusters uh involving pedestrians. Um and that was more focused um in the main street area up near the intersection with Parker Street um and just south uh
near city hall a so so the map on the left um shows our preliminary high injury uh networks um and the table on the right shows this the segments we developed uh including the limits. Um so in terms of the overall roadway segments, we divided
them into uh individualized segments where we where we saw higher um high crash locations occurred. Um and then as well same thing where we kind of looked at okay where are these pedestrian and cyclist crashing
occurred. Um and then we use the full road segment to calculate um and sort of compare our data um in terms of calculating the roadway crash rate um for just cross-checking our analysis um and and confirming our findings of of
high crash locations. Um and just to go through some of um the segments, I won't won't go through all of them. Uh but in the northern part you see segments along Green Street and Route 140. Um sort of the central area
we have uh segments including Parker Street, Main Street, Elm Street, Central Street um and sort of the residential roadways adjacent to them as well. Um Pearl Street and Betty Spring Road on the east side um and south including Tempee Boulevard and West Broadway um
and East Broadway as well. Um and then the column on the right side sort of shows those overlapping intersections. Um so segments along our high injury network we looked at again where where
were the most uh dense areas in terms of uh individual intersections. Um so we included those on the right as well. Um and the railway segments sort of encompass every adjoining intersection
uh included not just the um the the high injury intersections that we selected um it was more along the lines of those intersections were selected based on our criteria um and and could be included in in our
development uh towards the counter measures if we see uh it to be fit. So and for our intersections um we identified uh based on the overlapping segments um that I mentioned below. So
um the bottom table shows all those segments uh involved in in in in with our roadway segments as well as um three individual segments uh or individual intersections that we treated. So
uh we have central the uptown rotary on central street. Um so we chose to focus on that um and sort of cut off the surrounding surrounding roadway networks and treat that as its own entity. Um as well as we chose to focus our analysis
mainly after construction was complete in late uh late 2024. Um as well as we looked at Coleman Street at Bates Road where it was it was sort of a one fatal injury crash involving a pedestrian. Um so we felt
that was important in terms of accomplishing our goal of safety action plan. So we treated that as its own individual segment. Um as well as state route 140 and Pearl Street as the mass dot jurisdiction. Um so we felt that could be treated as its own individual
segments as well. Um and just go over some of the um the overlapping intersections. Uh we have West Broadway at Tony Boulevard. Um Parker Street at Oak Street at West Street. Like we mentioned before, a lot a lot of comments from the public coordinate as well. Um that intersection of where
Parker Street adjoins with Main Street and Central Street. Um Chestnut Street at Cross Street, which we heard um was a big concern at at from a gentleman at at the public meeting. So we included that um as well as uh Pleasant Street at City
Hall Avenue um among others as you can see from the table. And I just wanted to go over some of the segments and intersections we chose um and sort of some of the statistics uh as well as what we observed when we were out on our site visit. Um looking at our
higher network and and observing anything um that we saw could pose potential harm in terms of of safety. Um uh so look when looking at Tony Boulevard, our our roadway segments go
from the main street area down um to the to the Rotary under Route 2. Um as well as just south of that to just south of Tony Plaza. So that encompasses that strip. Um, and then looking further south, it kind of goes from that Walmart
Plaza, uh, or Walmart intersection driveway to the end of the town line. And along these segments, um, there were a total of 333 total crashes, uh, including eight crashes involving vulnerable users. And sort of some of the things we noted out there in terms
of when we're looking at these this high number of vulnerable user crashing um we saw a wide roads adjacent to Hannovers um including that that on-road bike path as well as um the on-road bike lanes that start just south of the rotary and
can continue until that just before the west Broadway intersection. Um and some of the contributing circumstances we noted along the roadway segment based on the crash data that was reported uh included failure to yield to rightaway uh failure to keep improper
lane uh potentially due to the to the wider lanes or or the extended um the bike lane and operating vehicle in a careless or erratic manner. And that kind of encompasses um failure to maintain proper lane uh as well.
So, another segment we looked at was West Broadway um Route 2A. Um and then noted from our crash data, we have 65 total crashes. Um three fatal injury crashes as well as four crashes involving foam roll users. Uh we noted
that the sidewalk was located on the south side of most of the road segments that we looked at. We kind of looked at um from the town line uh east um to where just before West Broadway um
and we notice a lot of of gaps within uh this segment obviously due to the adjoining driveways um the adjoining streets um and in terms of sight distance that could be a potential um potential cause of some of the crashes.
uh when looking at the fast speeds going down West Broadway as well. Um and we noted that in some of our contributing circumstances which were exceeded the authorized speed limit in attention as well as a failure to yield to right of way as well.
Another segment we looked at was Main Street. And in this segment we were looking at from Parker Street um and pretty much encompasses the whole uh Main Street segment when looking down to to Dolan
Street and and further east um ending up at Chestnut Street. Um so when we're looking at this section uh we noted 215 total crashes and including two serious injury crashes as well. um and and 13 crashes in vulnerable use
involving vulnerable users. So obviously um it's sort of the central area. So you'll see a lot of people um uh walking and and cycling. Um so that could be the cause of uh those those
crashes. Um, we noted some existing pedestrian facilities, including uh curb extensions, curb bumpouts to increase uh pedestrian visibility closer um to city hall have and and shortening that crossing distance. Um and some of these
contributing circumstances included operating vehicles um in a careless careless manner. Uh failure to yield to rightaway which we we've seen a lot on a lot of these segments and intersections as well as exceeded the authorized speed limit as well.
Uh and then the final segment I'll I'll briefly touch on is Pleasant Street. And when we're looking at this, um, there were 39 total crashes, including a serious injury crash, um, and five crashes involving vulnerable users. Um, sort of a mixeduse area. So, you'll see
a combination, uh, of different uses. Um no on street parking on Pleasant Street except for the the parking obviously near um city hall and uh failure to yield to rightway once again was one of the contributing circumstances including inattention uh driving too fast for
conditions and a sort of a disregard uh for traffic signals and markings which kind of combines that in attention and failure to yield to right ofway um contributing circumstance as well. Um,
so one of the intersections we looked at overlapping with that Tony Boulevard section segment, sorry, is the Tony Boulevard at West Broadway intersection and singleize signalized intersection. Um, and within the 5 years there were 64
total crashes. Uh, we saw 10 minor injury crashes as well as two crashes involving cyclists. Um when we were out there, we noted the lack of pedestrian signal timing heads. Um it was only located on the south south leg of the intersection. Um and when we were
walking out there, we we were testing so no protected pedestrian phase. So the oncoming traffic turning left in the westbound direction and the eastbound right direction um would have to yield to the pedestrians. Um and it's a
limited timing in terms of 15 to 20 seconds to cross uh with with those oncoming cars as well. Um and of those collisions with the cyclist, one was located in the roadway. Um
may perhaps on the sheros uh located at the nearby at the intersection nearby as well as one located in the mark crosswalk as well. Um and some of these contributing circumstances were failures to yield to rightway as well. um as
disregarded traffic signs and markings. Um the next intersection we'll look at is that intersection of Parker Street, Oak Street, and West Street. Um and noted here there's 67 total crashes, three serious injury crashes. Um as well
as three vulnerable user crashes. Um and out of the three vulnerable user crashes, one was a bic bic bic sorry bic crash that occurred in the roadway. Um and the collision with one of the collisions with the pedestrian was at
the crosswalk location. Um and the other collision with the pedestrian, it was not reported um the location of um that crash. Um, and the serious injury crashes were mainly caused by uh rear end collision uh while
stopped at the crosswalk um just east of Nickel Street. Um and that could could be caused by a vehicle following too closely, a sudden yield to a pedestrian and then um that that would
cause that rear end collision. Uh and then we also saw in some of the other serious injury crashes, conflict with vehicles merging uh slash entering the lanes as the geometry there is is definitely um a little bit more challenging um just just due to the
makeup of the design. Uh and some of the contributing circumstances we saw here were failure to yield to right ofway um vehicles following too closely as we saw from the serious injury crash um as well as in attention. Um another intersection we looked at
along along Pearson Boulevard as well as uh Elm Street was was that intersection at Pearson Boulevard at Elm Street. Um, so there are 26 total crashes and two collisions involving pedestrians uh and one involving uh a cyclist. Um, when when we were out there, we noted that
the green arrow when traveling westbound right is always always a free movement or a protected movement. Um so the exits including the car wash um which we heard a lot from the public coordinate as well as some of those
driveways just north driveways or adjoining roadways just north of the intersection um could cause some type of concern in terms of of vehicle not looking or or in attention as we see from the contributing circumstances or speeding
when when making that westbound right um movement. We noted uh the pedestrian facilities. There was only one on the west leg um only on the crosswalk. Um and we didn't
see any pedestrian phase for that signal. Um as well as it was kind of a difficult slope um when coming down it and trying to cross over um to that south side of of Pearson Boulevard. Um and the final intersection I will
talk about is the intersection of Central Street at Pine Street. Um so we have Central Street um as Central Street and Pine Street as two of the segments uh in our high injury network. Um and some of the crash data statistics
include 17 total crashes including one serious injury crash. Um four collisions involving pedestrians and two collisions involving cyclists. Um, so this is an area where there are a lot of a a decent amount or a sufficient amount of of
crashes involving vulnerable users. Um, and that can be contributed to the bus stop uh nearby east of the intersection. Um, as well as it's a central sort of a central area. So we we could see a lot of pedestrian and bicyclists. Um, and
out of these collisions with vulnerable users, the crashes occurred at at marked locations. Um, we noted a longer crossing distance on the south leg um when when traveling onto Central Street from Pine Street. Um, as well as the
crosswalk on the west leg. Um, if there were vehicles parked on the north side, it would kind of be blocked out. Um, if a pedestrian was trying to cross even though there was that uh pedestrian signage. Um so visibility is is definitely a thing we looked at in terms
of in terms of this intersection. Uh including some of the contributing circumstances being failure to yield to right away uh driving too fast for conditions and and in attention which um as as seen by the previous locations that we presented on is is kind of the
contributing circumstances that we're seeing a lot from these uh roadway segments as well as intersections. Thank you, Liam. Liam went through a lot of data. He went through the high injury network. He went through the specific locations for the segments and
intersections. We just want to have this open up our are there any surprising unexpected locations that we identified on the high injury network? And don't forget, we did overlay that with the Monachusa, the regional high injury
network from that regional CT action plan. and also those high safety improvement program that Mass DOT identify as crash cluster. We want to get your thoughts on on those identified locations. Are there any missing gaps
that we didn't include? Um confirming those locations, anything that we missed, things that we should be including? >> And Lisa, maybe go back to the first map that shows the high injury network. Great idea. Thank you.
>> The uh the picture ones are really just a sampling of some of them, but uh >> this shows the overall questions, anyone comments? >> Hey, George. >> Hey, excuse me.
How has it changed uh and since the completion of our plan or since the HIN was was uh made that the one that we made? Do you see any changes there? >> Do you mean the locations from the regional plan that you all identify and
then overlay that with the most recent crash data to see if those >> Yeah. Are there any subtractions or additions? And what about like increases at certain locations and so on? >> I think in general and and I'll just
jump in George and then while either Liam or Lis are maybe looking some of the information. Um now obviously we've added added locations and corridors and segments
just because of being more geared to the whole city area. Um, I think in general, and uh, Liam, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think in general, uh, the locations you guys had identified are
still popping up. You know, it's it's fairly consistent. Uh, you know, you were down, I think, in the Tiffany Boulevard, Route 2A area. Um, still a problem. Yeah, I yeah, I think mo most of the uh
segments and intersections uh we kept the same. I think maybe there was there's one or two um where in our our data collection there was maybe um two or three or two to six crashes um with
with low severity. So I think for for our study or our um high entry network uh we didn't include those but off the top of my head I I can't remember. So I'll get back to you on that. >> Okay. What what was the weight you what was the waiting you used
>> for? We we used similar waiting to um the one that was developed in your plan um as well as uh additional waiting for collisions with pedestrian and cyclists. Thanks,
>> George. Um, on any of the locations that you guys had in your, uh, HIN, um, is the is the region moving any of them into some kind of action?
>> Um, well, right, it's really up to the communities to uh to move them forward. um we can't move them forward with any really with without community uh >> community support and community you know
development uh right now we we're in a no um that we're doing we're doing RSAs we're going to be doing we got in the region there's there's uh 12 RSAs that were recommended in nine communities >> and so we're I don't know if it will be
made up of completing those 12 RSAs um no projects are being recommended. We we uh we tried some outreach. Uh it's a such a short period of we can really complete the applications that uh we
decide to go that route >> uh with the RSAs because that's something that we can we can do without really we we really uh would like community support but we don't need the community to to commit
>> Yeah. them themselves to completing them. >> So, >> so, >> okay. >> Did you say did u did you say any of the RSAs that you are applying for, do they include gardener locations or no? >> No, there's no RSAs that were
recommended in Gardner. So, >> all right. Thanks. >> Anybody else? Um, thank you, George, for that comment. We'll follow up as well and we'll have the map and a table where
it's a little bit more legible as well >> up on the website. >> Yes. And we'll forward we'll send it over to our members as well. >> Okay. All right. Let's uh move on. >> You can always you can always ask questions later as you as they pop into
your head. So >> cool. So Liam went into detail about the high injury network. That's really going to be about the crashes data reported. So we want to also talk about the high risk network. The high risk network, it
could be those areas where there are not crashes that are occurring like fatal or serious injuries, but more the characteristics of the roadways, link lane configuration, traffic flow, just in that type of environment. We're still
in the midst of developing the high-risk network um but we will be building it upon from the Massachusetts regional planning commission that regional CP action plan. So they have developed a high-risisk network and it includes a
variety of different uh risk factors and George if I'm speaking out of term or if you would like to add anything feel free to add on but it included factors of um volume in the sense of like if there's more cars there's more greater exposure
or chance of crashes the number of lanes if it's wider roads there's a higher risk um speed limit is such a big thing in the next couple slides will explain a little bit more about the impact of speed, but greater speed leading greater
risk of those severe impacts. Definitely taking consideration of the um of the vulnerability area in the sense of land use, seniors, lowincome, people who don't have a car, minority or those with
um limited English proficiency. And of course, we want to take account for those pet and bikes in the sense of those are areas where there are more likely to be in conflicts with those vulnerable road users with automobiles
on those higher class roadways that have those higher volumes. And then of course really taking a look at those fatal and serious injury rate higher in those designated small urbanized areas. So, uh, the regional plan, they did a
different factors of, um, different ratings. So, I'm just going to name a couple of those highest risk, and those higher risk were were those 8 to nine, and that occurred along Route 2A, Route 140. And then the second level of the
higher risk, it included roadways along um Route 101, east of Green Street, Elm Street, um along Cross Street between Pine Street and Chestnut Street, right by the Jackson Field, Logan Street
between Pine Street and Chestnut Street, and the last one I'll mention is the Nicholas Street between Parker Street and Baker Street. So when we're thinking about those high injury network that Liam went through the crash data, those are going to have those specific counter
measures, when we're talking about those high risk network, we're going to have those systematic um counter measures. How can we be proactive to prevent those fatal and serious injuries? So it's really important that we're identifying both uh networks. We want to be
proactive in in both of those networks. Any questions regarding that, George? Anything to add on? Uh, no, you did a great job. >> Okay, sounds good. So, we went through the high injury network, high-risisk
network. The next section that we're going to go over is those counter measures, those like recommendations, and I'll hand that off to Bill. >> All right. Yeah. All right. So, um, as we're just going to touch on some of
these really just to give you an idea of potential measures and actions that that we'll be looking at and thinking about as we really push to again eliminate fatal and serious injury crashes on the network.
So certainly priority is the HIN but then the high-risisk network will come into play as well. three major areas that uh keep in mind because we'll address them all. One is the engineering or infrastructure type of improvements. So
that might be a road road related change. It might be something physical added to the road. Um enforcement clearly uh an important aspect and education or promotion um as uh as we
try to again keep the word out keep things in people's mind for good driving uh behavior. Um the safe system approach proactive comprehensive. So that's another thing to keep in mind. So vision
zero eliminating all of them broad proactive uh movement. Um our objectives in in developing the plan in selecting actions uh include removing severe conflicts,
reducing speeds and eliminating that or reducing risky behavior. So on this um on this slide, Federal Highway has u done a lot of research over the years with input from universities, from
transportation centers, uh consultants and and there's a number of actions or countermeasures that they've identified as really effective at reducing some type of crash. So, for an example, rapid flash beacons at a crosswalk
um can reduce pedestrian crossing related crashes by 47%. So, so there's data like that out there that that we understand and and re and review before
we apply uh an action. Many of the actions on this slide are fairly simple, low cost. Um, you know, and I mean, you may think like a rapid flash beacon at uh at a crosswalk with two posts and all
that is $60,000. It's still a fairly lowc cost action when you compare it to re revising an intersection or designing a roundabout. You know, it may be a1 to2 million dollar project. So um there are
uh actions that are clearly lower cost 60,000 as well. Um uh so so in in this slide um the speed management techniques that have been identified by federal highway roadway
departure. So that's someone leaving the road on the side or even what's really not said in here is lane departure. So you cross the center line um so that you can apply certain techniques to address that issue as well. The intersection
treatment whether it's a traffic signal or unsalized location different things to uh uh consider whether it's turn lanes or make sure the back plates are there with reflective uh uh borders or
signal timing. Make sure um an all red is in place. Another thing that's not on this list, but we we add to this list as we go through things and it might be um maybe the corner rounding is so wide
that people fly around the corner and and then don't stop or can't see, you know, what's around the corner. So, daylighting the intersections or tightening the corner radi um are other
actions. no turn on red at traffic signals. Um we've we've mentioned that in some places that we've uh developed these action plans where if you may notice out in gardener that
boy people don't stop on the red before they make the turn. Well, we got into this habit 30 years ago of allowing you know movement. You stop on red and make your right turn. And uh after 30 years of it, we see a pretty high
percentage of people really don't stop and look. So maybe an action is for every traffic signal in the city that city has control on, put a noturn on red. Um easier to uh to do that and
enforce that and uh and certainly it saves lives. Red light running. So red light running isn't um you know shown on some of our stuff it's a problem but there's actions to
uh look at to cut down and eliminate red light running which is ends up being a very severe um crash result. Pedestrian bikes a lot of actions there. Uh enhancing the crossing protecting the the bikes on the road maybe separating
the bikes from the road. um medians uh to be refuge or slow traffic down. Um uh on the next slide, we just show a couple of examples of uh of types of actions. We're not saying we're putting any of these in, but they're just things
that um have been either used in other places or identified for potential use. These are just a small smatter. Um you can see the enhanced ped crossings up on the top left. on the bottom left you have uh what we
well that that's showing reflective border so you can see it at night. Um uh so that's that's important. Um uh another thing at night where uh we used to years ago um we would have every
traffic signal rest on red at after a certain time at night. And again, we got away from that. And and a lot of the getting away over the last 30 years was a movement towards efficiency, less congestion,
let people move. That was the that was the emphasis. Well, if we want to get away from that and go safety, you know, they got away from the rest on red at night. And now the last year, people are talking about, well, maybe we should do
rest on red. like it's a new idea, but it's all related to the safety. These things are center on the bottom, rumble strips, the both in the center line, which I think you have out in 140 uh that the state may have put in or edge
edge ones on uh you know, the real country roads, you know, might be maybe adding the shoulder and maybe widening the shoulder a little bit. On the bottom right there's um just markings. There's different ways to mark that tend to make the driver slow down a little bit
because it's different and it narrows the lane. Uh on the upper right, speed cushions. So, so uh I know everyone knows speed bumps, speed humps. We see them everywhere. We see them in shopping centers. Um we see them on some roads.
Uh I was on a road yesterday that I couldn't believe they were on and it was like the worst design speed bump ever. and uh on a country road. And I know at night no one would ever see them, but those became kind of a problem or uh
hangups to first responders or uh DPWs for snow plowing, street cleaning, things like that. So I don't know who came up with the idea but you know the engineer the profession
just we just we see benefit and we see the problem and we try to okay how can we change this to make it work better. So on the upper right is what we call speed cushions. Same idea as a speed hump on a roadway and they're used on residential streets.
They're used on collector roads. I've seen them on, you know, major city and town arterials and places. Um, the cushions provide a gap so that the first responder vehicles, the emergency
vehicles, fire trucks, um, can get through there without going over the hump. Um, you set the the wheelbase so that their wheels can go through their wheelbase uh, in separation. They're they're wider than a passenger car. Um,
so the passenger cars cannot avoid the hump. So anyways, then those are used for trying to calm the traffic down a little bit. The buffered bike lines, you know, give us some separation, identify it. Um, there's different ways of doing
that as well. Um, next slide. Uh, before I digress too much, um, so, uh, and I just want to come back to the speed thing. Um, so just again to keep everything in context and everyone's in
everyone's mind. So this is a safety action plan. Vision zero. The the goal is not to have people die or be seriously hurt on our roadway system. Speed is it's the number one probably, you know,
issue related to severity. Certainly you could be going speed limit and drive off the road and hit a tree. That's that's another issue. But but this slide shows, you know, what going 20 miles hour
versus 40 miles an hour can mean in terms of hitting a pedestrian. So 20 miles an hour, uh 95% of the people the pedestrians that are hit are going to survive and and most of them probably
aren't even seriously hurt. um go to 40 mph and 85% of them 85% chance of of fatality. So uh you can see like if you have a 30 mph roadway in a
residential uh street or 25 mile and someone's driving 40 and not paying attention and coming around a corner, you know, it there's a big difference. So, so speed becomes a a really important aspect of the plan and the
goal of meeting zero fatalities, serious injury. Uh the next slide just shows again an impact of speed on a driver's vision. So on the left on the bottom left you see the cone of vision. You're driving 20 miles an hour. You can see
pretty well. you know, uh you're going at a speed that either eyes, mind, everything works and you can you have a wide field of vision. Go to the far right at 40 miles an hour just going too fast to process everything
out to the edges. So again, speed becomes very important. What if you can't see the, you know, the kid running out between a park car um and uh because you going 40 miles, but maybe 20 you saw
the kid. Uh next slide. Um this is just a sample of again uh federal highway uh mascot uh so many safety advocacy groups uh as well as uh other
agencies around the country. You know we're all developing kind of tools to help us guide us to efficiently select potential actions to address certain issues. So this is just a sample of of that and speed management. Um, you might
have if you go down four rows, it says transverse rumble strips. So that's going across the road. So you're driving in the lane, you hit these rum little rumble things, little noise and wakes you up. But again, if you look at the
top, oh, we could apply that for speeding. We could apply that for impaired or distracted driving or uh crashes at intersections where we want to slow traffic down um before they have
to stop or go through the intersection. Uh next slide. So in addition, I I said fine, we have engineering and infrastructure. We've got other non-engineering type of measures that we we've got to consider
and build into the plan. Education and promotion, why is it important? Um what are tips? Um maybe safety campaigns. Um and local practices. So, so even with
uh um you know if with if regular road maintenance lane markings uh if the practice is pretty much just center lines and no edge lines or fog lines maybe maybe we go to that practice of
adding edge lines on some critical roads that that may have have uh visibility issues. uh roadway alignment uh guidance, you know, to add things like that. Um narrowing up the lanes or or
just just, you know, you know, DPW guys are out there. They're going on, they're on an assignment going down to uh you know uh clean out a catch base, but on their way there all of a sudden they see uh couple stop signs
uh blocked by overgrown vegetation. Make a note, you know, start to start a practice where it's noted. the note gets back to the office and the it gets into the process of take care get get the overgrown vegetation uh trimmed back. So
those kinds of things, you know, good practice. Um, some local things just again, it's fairly simple. It can can work into a routine where everyone on the on the DPW team for example or the police department, everyone's working as
a team. Um, next slide because another one is obviously enforcement. we've talked about in the police department, you know, we've we've met with the deputy chief and lieutenant, gone over some things and they're doing they're doing pretty good. Um they're
independently going out and uh getting grant uh money through the uh public safety um department at the state and they're using that that u grant money to do different things and uh and basically
campaign but maybe targeted enforcement. Um, but it's only, you know, can only go so far. Um, you don't have, you know, enough resources to have it out there all the time. This just shows on the
bottom of the slide the example of, uh, the program the the city is doing now, um, or this year. So, again, uh, it was really interesting. Clearly targeted speed enforcement um, you know, gets put in there. uh the campaign of click it or
ticket. So they're watching out for you know uh people wearing seat belts um distracted driving um they're out there doing that you know for a certain time. So again, targeted enforcement and you're hoping that changes behavior uh
as people see certain things and and what the program what our action plan should do is help enhance that and uh help the department be able to stretch resources, add to the resources, whether it's through speed feedback signs or um
at the legislative side at the state. There is in committee for discussion purposes this year of do we allow auto enforcement uh that's with cameras to again help with speed enforcement and red light running. It's not passed. Uh
it's in for discussion where three years ago it wasn't there for discussion. as we've gone around the state working on our projects, you know, the public comments coming in sometimes will be just saying, you know, I know how you
solve the problem. Put a camera up and ticket the person when uh they drive too fast. So, those kinds of things, including the speed feedback signs that you've seen out there on the road now, some of them now collect data and uh can
be implemented at low cost. And again, they enhance the manual resources that that the department has to help help control really speeds and safety. Uh, next slide. >> Uh, George, you had something to say or
add on. >> You're muted. >> Yeah. Will there be a a report on this when it's completed? After it's completed, >> a report on what, George? >> On what the police are doing with this grant? Oh, that's a good question. Uh,
Chief, are you on? >> I don't think so. >> Anyone from police department on? >> We That's something that we can follow up. We did >> We're following up on other items. That's something that we can see if they do do some type of reporting. I think
that would be helpful. But we can follow up on that. >> Who knows? The state the state grant program might require them to do so, right? >> Yeah. We We'll find out. Um, all right. Uh, next slide. Okay. So,
so part of the grant that we got for Gardner, um, has has a component in there for potentially doing some demonstration, uh, projects. Um, and that might be um
because maybe we maybe the decision makers are having a tough time saying yes, let's put that action in. So, they want to get some more feedback or see how it works. So, what what is a demonstration
project? Well, it's a temporary installation or it could be temporary, but it's quick quick build to test certain aspects of an act of of a countermeasure. So, it could be as an example, it could be
using markings, uh spray chalk, traffic cones, planters, something that you can grab really quick and um uh put out really quick. Um what they want us to do if we go ahead and do it
is to collect data beforehand, have them out there for a month or two, collect data while it's out there to determine the effectiveness and then use that information to make make a decision and does that action become part of the
action plan. So couple of examples on the next slide. Um, next slide. Yeah. So, there's examples of all right, what if we wanted to buffer bike bike movement on a roadway? So, you could use
flexible delineators. We could use just markings. You could use you could use barrels, you know, along a street. So, um there's different ways to quick build in low cost, but again, the idea is to demonstrate it to the decision makers,
demonstrate to the public. Um you see these flexible delineas. I don't know if there's any other slides, Lisa, but um you know, if you wanted to extend the curb around an intersection, tighten it up, you could use these markings and
delineators to um to do that as well. Um you can see on the left on the left side where just markings and delineate flexible delineators plop them in the ground real low cost. It's like 20 bucks a delineator and so
what are you doing on the left is the traffic slowing down to make a good turn around a safe turn around the corner. Um the one on the left that's in Medfield. Uh they also were using it to daylight
like in the old days. We seem to know no parking, no on street parking, 20 ft from the corner. Um we got away from that. But so Medfield's using this as a way to All right, let's see if we can daylight uh no parking on the corners.
Uh using this technique, you can see the temporary islands up top for pedestrian uh movement. Um I think one of the slides before showed temporary speed cushions again traffic coming just test. We've also seen and and I've I've I've
seen presentations on uh speed cushions where where a test was done in a DPW yard so that DPW and the first responders could assess and see what it's all about
and and drive trucks through it or around it on top of it. And uh and once they saw it done in a yard um then they said, "Okay, well why don't we test that on one street? Let's see how it goes."
And so city council approved one street. And within a year, there were like 20 30 locations where city council said, "I I think this this is working beautifully. No complaints. First responders, no
problems." And uh uh it's just a way to to uh manage speeds better. Right. So uh next slide. I must be done. >> Yeah, that slide is that moving. >> No, Bill. So we went through the um
engineering counter measures, the non-engineering ones. We went over the demonstration project as Bill noted as part of this safety action plan. What was so great is that in addition to developing the plan, we could do a demonstration project. Um Liam, Bill, we
all went out and and identify some potential locations and and we just want to hear your thoughts. Are these feasible? Are there other locations where you're like, I think this would work great based on our high injury network. Um we just want to hear more of your thoughts. or or are there actions
where you guys have doubts and you go show me show me how it works, you know, like that. So, um if you don't have an answer to that this minute, but uh something to think about over the next week or so and let us know. If Bill, if
I can just add in real quick. Um, I know we we've talked about this and maybe for the benefit of the others. From my perspective, speed around the city, especially downtown is an issue and I've always been resistant to the idea of any
kind of speed um bump, hump. Um, the cushions are are fairly new to me. Um, I know questions come up about speed at the city council level and councilors will say, "Well, let's put speed bumps in." And you know, we always have to kind of resist that urge. Um, for me, I
think a a good demonstration project would be a temporary um speed cushion and and there's probably many locations in the city we could do it. Um, so I I think in in even terms of, you know, getting support at the city level with the council and the mayor, um, they've
always been told, "No, we can't do those." And I I think this provides um a way to do it where I think everybody can at least temporarily agree, yeah, let's do it. Um so that's where I'd be, you know, trying to invest if we do a
demonstration project. Um because I think you you you start to say and and again long term this is probably low cost for the city to do them in multiple locations you know outside of the grant or you know when we do go for demonstr when we do go for implementation money
>> um I I think >> we could do this. So that's where I'd like to to kind of go towards >> yeah that's a perfect example of of doing it right. So you'll you'll get the
feedback one way or the other and all right. Anyone else uh want to chime in? >> As Bill noted, if not at the second, we will follow up. We'll ping on some of the questions about high injury network. Um I love the we love the idea of a
speed cushion. We'll identify some locations based on the high injury network, but if there are other locations, please feel free to send that send that information to us. All right. Well, moving along, we just have um two more items that we want to
talk about, upcoming items and upcoming tasks. So we are currently in Q2 which is crazy that we're in May but as you can tell we're working on identifying those strategies those projects on those high injury network we're incorporating
feedback from you all public coordinate comments especially where people are people are identifying for uh improvements and then of course that demonstration project. So, we need to we need to um get the coordination going with FHWA. We need to coordinate with
Rob Traffic Commission to identify those um locations and those actions. And then for our um Q3, we're going to have our VSAC meetings and then we're going to have our second public meeting and then we'll have a final report by the end of
the year. Um, okay. I know that we're running out of time, but we wanted to open up on any member discussion and we wanted to pose if July 15th uh at 10:00 a.m. for our third VSAC meeting would work well with
everybody. >> Hi, George. Ah, >> you're muted. That was an accident. Sorry. Um, we'll just note it. We'll send out a send that save the date and uh hopefully it works very well.
>> Lisa, >> yes. George, were you going to add anything? >> No. >> I think you said that was a You said that was a mistake. >> Oh, sorry. Okay. Um, sounds good. Um, first, thank you so much for your time. Second, thank you for being one of our
members to, you know, work towards that zero fatalities and serious injuries. And we will follow up and thank you for um attending the meeting as a Zoom and not a team's meeting. >> And uh again, feel free to email Rob or
any of us with any comments, questions uh outside of the box, whatever. You know, it's that's what we're here for. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Bye. >> Great job. Great job. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thanks.